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113793-break-up-letter-to-carbinencsoft
Content ---- ---- Sorry, Carbine's busy with me at the moment.... Best of luck in your future entertainment endeavours... Also... Can I have your stuff? | |} ---- ---- You mean me, right? Cus I'm pretty sure they're busy with me atm. | |} ---- ---- I've got a couple of theories about what happened here. Don't know if any of them are true, but here goes. 1) Possibility One: They just ran out of time. They knew they needed casual content, they intended to have casual content, but it fell off the launch schedule as they scrambled to get the large group endgame PVE content up and running. Given how buggy the raids were at launch, it seemed like they were absolutely up against the wire for time when launch day came. This would explain why Veteran Shiphands still don't exist. They focused on prepping the large group endgame content because that has been their main content stand-out all along -- "We're going to have large dedicated raids again!" Therefore that had to take priority. 2) Possibility Two: They made some key central design decisions nine years ago when development started and it was a very different MMO market -- basically an entirely different generation of gamers has come up in the time Wildstar has been in development. The market moved on but they had too much invested to completely redo the game's core concept and philosophy (I mean, they already did a major restart about five years ago if what I hear is correct.) They realized a couple of years ago that their market had shifted again, but it was just too late to start over yet another time. 3) Possibility Three: Arrogance on the part of the devs -- a true and misguided belief that WoW is really "ruined" and that what the MMO market really wanted was to go back to Vanilla. I see this quoted a lot as the reason for the total hardcore focus, but having worked in the industry I tend to think that possibilities one and two are more likely. While there's a chance that some of the key devs were sitting around going "Fack WoW! Fack casuals! We'll show them how a REAL gamer does it!! They dunno SQUAT! We'll show them! They RUINED OUR MMO! We'll rebuild it like it was supposed to be and SHOW THEM ALL!" -- I can't see that being true of the entire company. Certainly there are some devs who come across as "We know what really makes a game good!" but it's hard to separate how much of that is actually them and how much of it is marketing wind. On the other hand, that bit in Gaffney's resignation letter about "strong differences of opinion" coupled with comments on Glassdoor about all the infighting and cliquishness in the company makes me think there were at least a few devs who kind of had rectocranial inversion issues about the "hardcore market". Not sure it could plausibly be the entire company, however. | |} ---- Perhaps another option: 4) Carbine gave MMO players exactly what they asked for. Then MMO players realized that they got what they wished for.... I know you don't like blaming the customer; but honestly I think in this case it really is one of the major issues Something here about the players holding some 'fault' for part of the problems W* faces at present. Certainly not the only; but one that's probably a lot more influential than we may like to think. From a gameplay and systems perspective; W* is pretty much everything MMO gamers could have dreamed of.... But now were stuck with getting what we once wanted.... EDIT: See strikethrough Edited September 16, 2014 by Nazryn | |} ---- Buddy of mine just level a medic from 0-50 and got attuned to GA in 9 days. You might wanna rethink that statement. | |} ---- It's one There was a Wildstar Dev on Wildstar Nation's last podcast that complained about rushing to push out the game, it lead to the bug problem, the UI problem, and the lack of casual content. Dead on right on that point. He laid out all the ugly card on the table about what went wrong in game. I posted the video, and it got shoved into a dark corner. | |} ---- Maybe, but even if it wasn't rushed; there would still be these topics, and still be these selfsame complaints. | |} ---- Maybe. Maybe I could have been next Brad Pitt. Your point? My point was it was rushed, and now we got this population problem, along with this acrid attitude about the game because Carbine is taking 2 months to fix it. All these I can physically prove exist. | |} ---- My point was look at every forum for every MMO ever made and you see the same complaint threads. Carbine could literally throw gold at us and we would find a reason to complain.... | |} ---- So you don't think there is a problem? Really? If several podcast and channels dedicated to this game just up and cancelled, there is no problem. If the last several updates were "fixes" and not content, this also no problem. If Megaservers are an answer to population, there is no problem... BUT HEY it's okay... people complain about everything... I'm right? | |} ---- I think there is a synergistic confluence of issues that include but are not limited to warped consumer expectations. I think W* is more or less exactly what many MMO gamers have been wanting for some time; but that we are now realizing as much as we wanted that extra 5 pound gourmet cheesecake we just can't take it anymore. This coupled with some more minor issues like bugs and systems not being 100% what individuals want makes an otherwise awesome game seem less so to many potential players. I think in many respects real issues are ignored in favour of perceived issues as well. Mostly because people as a heurestic rule have evolved to act not analyze; and as a result are predisposed to make Type I errors (e.g. picking up your spear after hearing a rustling of the grass because you falsely identified the rustle as a Wolf in the grass) rather than Type II errors (which will get you killed by the wolf in the grass you ignored thinking it was the wind). | |} ---- ---- In other words, you don't think this is a problem. Ok keep playing, let's see how fast reality catches up. | |} ---- I agree completely. Everyone hearkens back to "the gold old days" of Vanilla WoW and yet they can't be arsed to figure out new and difficult content much less grind out some rep to get an item. While I won't say WS is without flaws, we all know it has them, its a ridiculously good MMO with the best combat available bar none. The issue is that people get this perception that its terrible because they don't like X or Y and enough people have left at this point that its going to be very very hard to remedy the damage already done. I for one have no intentions of leaving the game and thinking the combat is mind blowingly good. I couldn't possible go play some tab targeting, slow paced, single button macro rotation MMO and not with for this combat system. | |} ---- Don't push it Shah. I made it very clear that that WAS NOT my position. If you aren't going to listen in a discussion then you are going to turn what could be a useful discussion into a waste of time. | |} ---- This argument was made for both FFXIV and Tabula Rosa... *wink* There is no M Night Shambala twist for these game's fate... or this one. | |} ---- You will not be missed! Mega servers are coming and you're going to miss out.. This game will always update and will be a never ending game. It's what mmo's are. | |} ---- I am not invested into making you feel bad, I just made a point. If you feel bad, it is all you. I just simply asked a question, "So do you believe nothing is wrong with the game". You dove into saying they provided everything we wanted, and that was your answer "Nothing is wrong". | |} ---- Hardly... FFXIV was a broken on a fundamental level. The combat was mind numbingly slow, global server ticks for DoTs, telegraph timing and damage calculation, animation lockouts for days. Don't even try to compare the two games. Instead of trying to tell everyone how bad WS is you should probably just go back to club penguin and save us the time of arguing with you. Ps: Acting superior doesn't make you cool. | |} ---- It is literally impossible for anyone on the internet to make me feel bad. But you could very well earn a point or two from buster. and that would put this thread off topic fast, I never implyed nor stated there were no problems. I said explicitly: | |} ---- So do you believe nothing is wrong with Wildstar? | |} ---- Do you believe that nothing is wrong with all the mmo's out there? Oh come on!!! Every MMO has issues. Just cancel your account, and give your stuff away already. | |} ---- So correction... You are saying there is nothing wrong with the game, and it's solely the customer's fault for the non-existent problem? My bad. Clearly simple yes and no statement requires blaming customers. Did not ask that :) I asked, "so do you believe there is nothing wrong with Wildstar and the current situation? Dodging the question aren't we? *wink* | |} ---- Yes you are! My answer is above. Too bad you can't see it. | |} ---- Where in the term Do you read "there are no issues" ? You are literally claiming the opposite of my statement. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt; but it's bad form to ignore what people are saying in favor of replacing their statements with your strawmen. If we are going to continue discussing, please keep in mind what we actually post, rather than what you might like to believe we posted. Please and thanks, Naz | |} ---- "warped consumer expectations." Insert foot in mouth. | |} ---- People pay good money to market researchers to identify what products are actually potentially profitable just because the people who howl the loudest about various things are never a representative sample of the potential market. This is Product Development 101. If you're suggesting that Carbine worked on this game for nine years based on rantings on the WoW forums and nothing else, I'm sure you're completely wrong. (If they did, they are beyond moronic, and I don't actually think that's the case.) Hell, even BLIZZARD doesn't make game design changes based on WoW forum rantings, and it's their game! Identifying your real market and what the people in it are willing to pay for in terms of product is one of the very first things you have to do when creating a business plan if you want outside investment. You have to make your case to get the funding, and there's no way that a few dozen or a few hundred or even a few thousand posters gritching endlessly on the WoW boards makes any kind of a case, not when you're hoping to attract anywhere from a couple hundred thousand to a couple million players to your game. It's not like it's any kind of industry secret that a damned small percentage of MMO players are hardcore raiders. Do you really believe that Wildstar's design decisions were made due to MMO player bitching on forums? No chance, although they might say that to try and cover their butts. The only likely influence this could have had would come from the fact that some of the devs appear to be among the gritchers themselves, because developers who originate a project tend to build it along the lines of what they themselves most like to play. So the only real thing that might make sense is that the devs made the game the way it is not because "MMO players said they wanted this!" but because the devs themselves wanted it, and they seriously overestimated how many other MMO players shared their enthusiasm for that play style. That I could believe, but certainly not that Carbine is composed of automatons who were just blindly doing what MMO players told them to do. No way. The way you state this it's like the Carbine devs were innocents, taken advantage of by the evil MMO players who said they'd pay for Wildstar, and then coldbloodedly jilted Carbine and left the devs weeping bitter tears of betrayal in the rain. Shame on those faithless MMO players, lying to poor naive Carbine like that! Shame! ....Except NOT. Carbine is made of adults who are experienced devs, and trying to claim the MMO players were somehow responsible for their crappy decision making is just a mind-boggling bit of self-deception. | |} ---- ---- The MMORPG market itself is quite niche May (at least in the traditional MMORPG sense), and it's only growing smaller by the year. I am not suggesting the consumers are big baddies; I'm suggesting that the MMORPG genre is on it's way out of vogue. Like I said, I think A major influence is in fact warped (or if you prefer, shifted) consumer expectations; but I believe I made clear that that is by no means the ONLY issue plaguing W* as well as the broader MMORPG market today. NCSoft is moving towards Mobile games this year; most other development / publishing studios have already done so... because that's where the money really is in today's MMO market. As weird as it may sound to some people; NCSoft and the few AAA MMORPG publishers are in all likely-hood the last hurrah of MMORPG's as we know them. If it's not clear May, I'm not blaming consumers for Carbines bad decisions; I'm blaming the shifted consumer expectations for creating the damned if you do damned if you don't position Carbine has been stuck in. I've posted at length about issues with the game and its systems in other threads, and while I don't want to repeat it all here, I am by no means suggesting the game itself or carbines development decisions were /are perfect... | |} ---- I can't make my statement any more clear than it already is I in no way shape or form insulted you or your reading skill. I commented that you CAN read well, because you have in the past posted very thoughtful contributions to threads. Yet in this one you insist on intentionally misconstruing my explicit statements. I have levied no insults or ad hominem at you or anyone in this thread; nor am I playing with any words. I've been as literal as possible with the English language here. As it stands, the thread's been thoroughly derailed. | |} ---- On a consumer note here.. i think one of the biggest issues developers have now a days is covering bases on diversity since most of the players come from diffferant mmo's we have tastes. the more games we play the more we become selective on what we will and will not tolerate. We all have the infamous.. wow i wish this game had a such and such like (insert game here) it would make it some much more enjoyable here if they had it... all of us play into this to some extent. Kinda like dating if you do a lot of it you start becoming more selective on your wants and needs because theres more options available. | |} ---- I think this is probably a significant part of the issue. What you describe here though, I would suggest, synergestically couples with the shorter entertainment attention spans much of our community has today. We've become both more selective in our gaming experiences and devote less time and focus to each game we do play IMO. | |} ---- Naz, this is the way your posts are coming across on this issue: Players: "We want hardcore raids!" Carbine: "Okay! Give us a while -- okay, nine years -- and we'll make those for you!" Players: "Oh, turns out we didn't know what we wanted. Sucks to be you, I guess!" Carbine: "WHAT?! No! No! You can't do this to us!!" ...and then you say that the problem is that "MMO players are at fault for not knowing what they actually wanted." But it's up to the product developer to track trends and make sure he has a good idea of what's actually in demand. It is in no way the consumer's job to keep him informed of their changing tastes, nor to buy a product they might perhaps have been interested in at one time but no longer want. It's up to the product developer to accurately judge the market -- it's not the market's responsibility to keep him informed and give him time to refine and adjust his business plan. When you say stuff like: ...I just can't take you seriously. Blizzard knew many years ago that most MMO gamers were not dreaming of hardcore raids -- that most of them could honestly care less. Wildstar is not "everything MMO gamers could have dreamed of", not by a long shot, and it is not even close to "What we once wanted" for the vast majority of gamers. Generalizing a few hundred whiny ex-WoW players griping about how the game isn't "their game" any more because of all the casual filth around these days with their "welfare epics" into "everything MMO gamers could have dreamed of ..and...what we once wanted" is just...just... Come on, it's just WRONG. I can't come up with any better word than that. It's wrong. There never was a time when very many MMO gamers dreamed of and wanted 40 man raids. Never. | |} ---- this | |} ---- Most of that time was spent on developing the engine and very basic systems. IIRC major development only really started around 3 years before launch (telegraphs weren't even a thing until that point anyway; meaning major gameplay systems weren't even formed until just a few years before release). As recently as NOW people all over the MMORPG community are vocalizing a dezire for challenging content. I still see posts on the SWTOR forums QQíng about the easy mode raids, same with FFXIV forums. I don't disagree with your main points; But there is only so much that market research can do when the limitations of reality and trying to please a shifting player base. I never claimed or suggested MMO players were at 'fault'. I suggested that shifts in the player expectations are part of the problem plaguing W* as well as most other MMORPGS, but by no means that they are the only problem by far.. I stand by that, but I think we could have an interesting discussion on that point. The first Content drop was solo / casual content. That was in the pipeline for months pre release. I don't think Carbine didn't realize they needed casual content either; but I think they are realizing we are not happy with content releases at a pace we saw with OG WoW; we wan't all of our casual content immediately; otherwise we are going to go play destiny (this is one small example of what I refer to as shifting player expectations). I get your point; but w* also has a plethora of 5 man and casual content and more INC. I wouldn't disagree that they might have miscalculated what their ideal content proportions should have been... But I would say it's probably more of a timing thing than a content proper thing. Clearly they have had a LOT of casual content in the pipeline for drops for a while... (at least 4-6 months to be hitting live soon). | |} ---- that is hardcore | |} ---- It was Frost, in the Parlor, with... Sabotage! | |} ---- Given that their drop schedule has officially been crumpled up and thrown in the trash, I think you must've meant to say "to be hitting live soon, in at least 4-6 months". | |} ---- Naz. Dude. That quote in my post was verbatim word-for-word what you originally wrote. ("MMO players are at fault for not knowing what they actually wanted.") I went back to your post to find it...and saw that you had changed the wording so now you can state you "never claimed or suggested that" when that's exactly and precisely the word and phrase you used. I really thought better of you than that. If you misspoke your meaning, at least acknowledge that rather than editing your post and stating that you never said exactly the thing that you said. | |} ---- My point wasn't on when it would hit; but how long it's been planned. The drop cycle is at least 6 drops after live content at any given time. So Drop 3 didn't just come about because of player feedback; they had more casual content planned for a fair amount of time. I'm not suggesting their release strategy was the best (it wasn't) or that they didn't focus too much on 'Hardcore' content (they did). But I'am suggesting that they always intended to have strong casual oriented content from the get-go but split it up into later drops for what ever reason (should have been out at launch IMO). | |} ---- Unless it's just an addition I tag all my edited posts. Which one are you quoting and I'll go fix it if I indeed changed something with out flagging it. | |} ---- This is how it now appears. It used to say "I think in this case MMO players are at fault for not knowing what they actually wanted." That's where I pulled that quote from. Note you said "blaming" here, which goes much better with the original "fault" phrase than the new "it really is one of the major issues." The sentence as you rewrote it is borderline incoherent. | |} ---- You must have picked off your original copy while I was still typing out that post. If you haven't noticed, I post a comment, then spend the next 10-30 seconds fixing typos / idea arrangement. I honestly don't recall ever having typed that term (fault) in because that was never what my claim has been. But for your piece of Mind I will indicate in that post what you are saying here. EDIT: updated the post in question Edited September 16, 2014 by Nazryn | |} ---- I couldn't agree more... | |} ---- You also said this over in the Sub/F2P thread: "The customers really were the problem" is just a rewording of "MMO players are at fault," isn't it? I can't tell if you've changed your mind because you realized your position was unsupportable, or if you just decided that this kind of phrasing didn't accurately reflect your true meaning, but it's been a consistent theme with you so you can't exactly complain that other posters are reading stuff into your posts that you don't intend. This is the same thing you implied here in this thread -- that Carbine is basing all its design decisions on what players are whining about in game forums and they have been doing that since the early design days (using WoW's forums back then instead of their own to formulate their business plan.) I'm sure they are using game forums as a source of certain kinds of information, but do you really think the problem is the consumer if Carbine blindly follows the dictates of the loudest screamers in the player market when it decides what to base a game's design on or what changes to make to it later on? Again -- they would have to be morons to make their decisions that way. And I don't think they are. So I disagree with your take on this in two important ways; one, I don't think Carbine is actually directing their business decisions based on forum whining and I don't think they ever have, and two, I think that if they actually were doing this, it would in no way be the fault of the whiners themselves. It would be Carbine's for listening to them and not doing independent verification through other, better sources like actual market research. | |} ---- I apologise if I have been unclear. My claim is that the SHIFTING and SHIFTED expectations of the MMORPG community are PART of the problem facing W*. The major communication hangup could be the following. I'm suggesting [ the above mentioned consumer issues are A problem]. You seem to be interpreting my stance as being [ the above mentiond consumer issues are THE problem]. I take full responsibility for any unclear posts that may have led you or anyone else to believe the latter rather than the former. I'm not saying players don't know what they wan't; I'm saying their expectations have both shifted and are shifting. This means effectively that the community of today is both overly specific in what they will play based on the sheer availability of games of a variety of genres; coupled with the lower focused play times among game players; and a shift to more instant-gratification genres + a lot of muddled psycho-sociological complexities that have changed the consumer base for MMORPGs from a more stoic state to a more dynamic and game-mobile state. One example is the expansion of the FOTM MMO player cohort within our community. Their expectations are inflated to the point of being effectively unreachable; and so rather than find a game they enjoy they rush the content in every new game, then leave it for the next. This is an example of the type of shifting expectations I'm referring to. And the fact that this cohort of our community was very small / essentially non-extant back in 2003 and is now significantly prolific is an example of the type of shifted expectations I'm referring to. Consumer analysis, like most professional analysis, makes the implicit assumption of stationarity; which many dynamic consumer bases do not display. Does that make sense? If not I will do what I can to clarify. EDIT: additions in orange. Edited September 16, 2014 by Nazryn | |} ---- ---- ---- I'm just going to leave this here: | |} ---- Hmmm. Let me try restating it and you can let me know if I've got it. I've color-coded what you said and what I think you're trying to say to make it easy to match. Today's MMO player acts like that they can go play some OTHER MMORPG if they don't like this one; they don't spend enough time playing the game to appreciate it; they're spoiled and entitled + I will use meaningless jargon in the hope that you don't notice that I am literally babbling now. As a result, they don't just sit around and take it when a game tries to force them to do a bunch of stuff that they don't want to do, instead they get up and go to a different game that doesn't force them to do a bunch of stuff that they don't want to do. I'll admit that I have some difficulty endorsing your position. It essentially defines the problem facing Wildstar as "people stop playing a game if they stop having fun." I have to admit that I do not view this as a radical shift in the perspective of the gaming population. I also don't believe that this is, in fact, the problem facing Wildstar. I would submit that the problem facing Wildstar is that there was not nearly enough focus on the question "Is our endgame fun?" | |} ---- ---- ----